


Sunsets

by petercapaldiscoiffure



Series: Emeline Trevelyan [11]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Trespasser Spoilers, with a side of plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-14
Updated: 2016-07-14
Packaged: 2018-07-23 21:47:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7481211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/petercapaldiscoiffure/pseuds/petercapaldiscoiffure
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-Solas, the Inquisitor convalesces before the Council, Iron Bull acts as nursemaid and questions about the future need to be considered.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. An End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A combo of a one shot written for Tumblr, and the short sequel written roughly six months later. I have no idea how healing in Thedas outside of spirit fingers fancy magic works, so... I also just assume the arm came off back at the Winter Palace, for dramatic purposes.

Iron Bull had carried Emeline to their room the day after the operation. Even hours after the lotus tincture had mostly worn off, her legs shook and her eyes were bleary. Between that and the poppy milk blurring her thoughts, walking was out of the question. Bull refused the offer of a wheeled chair or cot where his arms would do just fine, and embarrass her less when she was awake to hear the gossip. Arms looked like romance - a gurney looked pitiful, and she hated pity.

Down the halls of the Winter Palace, from the infirmary to their newly appointed rooms in the Guest Wing and past all the stares and whispers, Dorian, Sera and Cassandra had done their best to block the view and glare the gossip into silence. A troupe of healers - Divine Victoria's very own - had followed, fussing behind him and stinking of herbs and lyrium, arranging potions and salves on the desk while he laid her in their bed. The surgeon herself, a round little woman with red cheeks and stern eyes, pressed a brown bottle of poppy and elfroot into his hand with instructions to keep her sedated until she'd had some real sleep. 

"An injury like that...well, I work clean, emergency or no, and I've no doubt it'll scar over fine. But a limb's a limb, and whatever that magic did to her on top of it, I can only guess. Never seen the like. She'll mend, mind you, but it's going to hurt for a good while, and she should be off her feet for at least a week while her body heals itself." She peered up at him with beady eyes, brow creased sharp and deep. Bull had to stifle the urge to stand up straight and "Yes, Tama" her. "Good, soft bread and butter, porridge and broth, none of those rich sauces or pies. Eggs, soft boiled, and lots of the tea I'm leaving with you, even if she won't want to drink it. It's nasty stuff but it will keep the humours balanced. I'll be back to change the bandaging tomorrow and my apprentice will take over the smaller tasks after that. I'll return to check on her in the evenings. But if the arm goes cold or hot, she starts to lose sensation, or there's even a _hint_ of magical degradation, you call for me immediately and no one else, do you understand, young man?" 

He'd nodded, rubbing the back of his aching neck. The saarebas had gotten in a few good hits, and with his adrenaline finally sapped, it was starting to show. 

"Boring food, nasty tea, watch the arm. Can do." His eye only turned back to look at the healer once before returning to watch Emeline's steady breathing under the covers, her face so still her eyelids didn't even flicker with dreams. He couldn't help but be grateful - he'd had enough of the fucking Fade for a lifetime, and he didn't like the thought of her wandering around in there all alone, even in sleep, not right now. He thought about her eyes rolling back in her head as the poppy took over and the saw came down, the grip of her small, cold hand in his going limp, and he felt slightly sick. He looked back at the healer.

"Hey, uh...ma'am, can she have oranges?" The healer raised a brow, and the barely there curl of her lips had Bull's ears twitching. He thought of Varric teasing him about blushing, just a few days before. 

"She likes them," he muttered. 

"Well. I suppose I don't see the harm, as long as she's eating enough bread and the sort, to soften the juice on her stomach." Her expression softened just a bit. "She'll be just fine, you'll see. Tired, and cranky as a ram with a tick, but right as rain soon enough." With a sharp nod of her head and a brisk pat to his arm, she left, taking her apprentices with her.   

Bull stayed with Emeline while she slept, tried sleeping too and found it impossible. He flipped through a book, then another, got bored and put it aside, fidgeted a little and then picked it up again, put it down again. He counted through the stock of potions and medicinals the healer had left behind, sniffing a few of the vials for hints of poison, sneezed a few times and worried if he'd just accidentally contaminated them. Poison he could suss out - the intricacies of healing potions were another thing entirely. 

He got it in his head to make some tea, then dropped a cup in his exhaustion and held his breath while Emeline shifted under the covers. He let it out when she didn't wake, and made short work of sweeping up the shards, mumbling a few tired curses under his breath. Finally his belly had rumbled and he'd decided he might as well go grab some food, maybe some bread and fruit for her when she woke, some of those flaky rabbit pies they made at the tavern for him. 

Later, laden down with food and head sore from question after question from worried friends and curious strangers, he walked into their rooms to find her staring at the fire from the bed. The covers he'd carefully pulled around her were shoved down to her waist. Her arm - what was left of it - was still bandaged tightly, resting on the pile of pillows he'd arranged, but he could see even from the doorway her shoulder was tense, probably aching something fierce. She didn't look up at him, just watched the flames while he shut the door.

"I'm so stupid." Her voice was sluggish, still thick with potion and sleep. "The whole time. And it was him, just...waiting." She glanced up, the circles under her eyes looking like bruises in the shadows of the darkened room. "You knew."

"Kadan, I -"

"Well, you _suspected_. I remember. You thought he was strange." She rubbed the sand from her eyes with the heel of her palm, rough and careless, and Bull was struck for just a moment at how young she looked, fuzzy from sleep and sedation. Vulnerable. When she next spoke, though, her voice had turned hard. "And I didn't pay attention to the fact that the Ben-Hassrath trained spy in my employ thought the shifty apostate with no background, no people, no history, was strange. So. What would you call that?" 

Bull was quiet - Emeline had turned back to staring at the fire - and he carefully set down the plate of food in his hands on the low trestle table. He started to cut the sweet brown bread into thick slices, mulling over his words. 

"I'd call it trust. You trusted someone who courted it, and had a thousand years on everyone around him." He shrugged, "Cassandra trusted him. Leliana at least trusted him enough to realize he was useful for a little while and take the risk. Old, smart, and everyone too scared to care where you're getting your answers from? That's a tough combination to beat." He glanced back at her. "Don't blame yourself for something a spymaster couldn't have predicted. Doesn't make any sense, does it?" 

She lifted one shoulder in a half-hearted shrug - the wrong shoulder, and her wince mirrored his. Bull turned back to his task, trying not grind his teeth to the tune of her pained breathing. He spread a thin layer of butter, fresh-churned and golden, across a couple slices of bread, and arranged them on a tray along with a tangerine from the Palace's own greenhouses. Little cups of poppy milk, potions of elfroot and dawn lotus followed. 

"And I thought he was weird, sure, but shit. I never thought he was some sort of pissed off god." Bull set out to start some tea - more successfully, with any luck - and brought the tray to Emeline while the water was left to boil, sitting gingerly on the edge of the bed. 

"Healer said you need to eat." Emeline wrinkled her nose, and Bull just held up a piece of bread. "No food and you're gonna be puking up your potions ten minutes after you drink them, Birdie. Eat."

She blinked for a moment, dully mutinous before weariness and Bull's red-rimmed eyes won out. She took the bread and he started on peeling the orange as she took a bite.

"The chess," he heard her mutter, still chewing. He looked up, a bemused little smile on his lips.

"You up to games already?"

Emeline raised her eyes, tilting her head as she swallowed.

"I should have caught on with the chess game." She took another bite, and then another, chewing slowly. "Caught on to something anyway. Shouldn't trust anyone that can play a whole game of chess in their head for weeks on end. 'S not natural."

Bull's brow raised, and he snorted. 

"Hey, I didn't turn around and knife you in the back, and I almost beat his little ass."

Emeline rolled her eyes, but she smiled too, taking the sections of orange he handed over to her with something almost approximating eagerness. When he rose to get the kettle that was now whistling merrily, he heard her voice behind him, sounding just a little bit steadier.

"Well, maybe. The day's young, though, you still have time. I think, anyway, you haven't told me what the hour is"

Her tone was light - well, lighter. Still, for some reason his stomach went cold. It was a testament to his exhaustion from the last few days that his face would have actually betrayed it, if he'd been facing her. Something nagged at the edge of his brain, possibilities he knew existed and actively tried not to think about, since as far as he was concerned they never could have happened - never _would_ have happened. Not now, with her, with him, the way they were together - the people they were together.

Still.

Then he splashed hot water onto his hand. He swore, she was pulled out of her head enough to cluck like a worried little hen, and the moment - whatever it was - was lost.

"Oh, are you hurt?"

"Nah, it's nothing, don't worry yourself." It could do with a bit of salve, later, but he ignored it for the moment. Instead, Bull brought the tea over, smelling as foul as the healer had warned. "Supposed to taste like shit, but I'll bet you've had worse." He held the cup up to her lips, and she took a sip, immediately cringing away from it.

"Maker, it's like warmed over swamp water. From the Fallow Mire."

"That good, huh?"

"You laugh, but you drink poultices. I don't think you can rightly judge."

He smiled faintly, shrugging. "Yeah, you're probably right. Come on, down the hatch, the sooner you get it over with the sooner you can eat something, get the taste of ass water out of your mouth."

Emeline rolled her eyes. "Ever the poet, my love," she muttered. But she gulped the tea down quick, all the same.

"There you go." He took the cup back, pulling a face at the smell. "Thought you might want to know they put the audience with the Council on hold, on account of the whole almost dying thing."

"Oh. Well, that was very thoughtful of them, I'm sure. Though I hardly know why they don't want me stumbling into the chambers, completely off my tits with poppies and lotus and maybe some..." she sniffed one of the little cups of potion on her tray, "mint? Alright, well, the mint won't be very entertaining to my adoring public, I admit."

"Yeah, real nice of them to postpone the party. So, according to these notes you want to take the..." he squinted, eyeing the potions, "the blue-y one there first - yeah. And then that pink one - huh, that's pretty - kind of a raspberry, isn't it? Does it taste -" Emeline gagged as she drank, shaking her head. "Er, right, that's a no, then. And then the white stuff and you're good." 

Emeline wrinkled her nose as she drained the last cup, handing it off to him.

"I think you missed your calling as a nursemaid, you know. Senior Enchanter Heloise would have signed you right on to the infirmary at Ostwick, I'm sure of it."

"You think? Hey, do the Circle nurses wear cute little robes, because I could definitely - "

"It's not _that_ sort of healing, Bull. I know, very sad. Though I'm sure if you wanted to wear a cute little robe, no one would protest."

Bull's head dipped as arranged the empty cups, smiling to himself. "I dunno - I think between the two of us, you pull off the sexy skirts thing a whole lot better."

"Flatterer." 

He passed her a small plate with the second half of her orange, to clear the medicine from her mouth, and gathered up her tray. He deposited it on the table before gently sliding onto the bed, arranging pillows so he could lean back without gouging the headboard. He wondered why she wasn't eating the fruit until he realized he hadn't split it into pieces yet - she was probably wondering whether to just take a bite or how embarrassing it would be to pull it apart with her fingers and teeth. Quickly, casually, he reached over to start sectioning it himself.

"So, the Council. The thing is, I was talking to Leliana, and...well, it doesn't look so good." He paused, considering. "The Qunari, Solas. Me." Emeline glanced up sharply at that, and he shrugged, tired, feeling every ache down to his bones. "It looks suspicious."

"But that's ridiculous -"

"No, Em. It's not. Think. You know how it looks, we've talked about it, even before all this crap.” When she opened her mouth to protest, he shook his head. “Stop, kadan. What it looks like is the Inquisitor's been fucking a Qunari for over two years. Doesn't matter whether they knew I was ever a spy - now the Antaam somehow has enough intel to infiltrate and stage an invasion? It's too convenient, too clean. There's no solid evidence because there _is_ no evidence, but they aren't going to give any Qunari the benefit of the doubt, Tal-Vashoth or not. And definitely not one that's been beside you these last few..." 

Bull realized with a start that his throat had gone oddly tight. He stopped, cleared it a little, grunting for good measure. "I'm just saying, they don't know everything, but they know enough. Gossip, tidbits, shit that makes it easy to draw the worst conclusions if that's what they want to do. They can't do anything else about it, but they can get pretty damn angry if they want." He didn't need to elaborate that that was precisely what they wanted to do, and they both knew it. "It's bad. All of it. Might be bad enough to make them overlook all the good you've done."

"Oh, like closing the giant fucking hole in the sky that almost killed everyone in Thedas? _Twice?_ " she snapped. She winced at her own voice, glancing at him apologetically. "I'm just...sorry. I know you're right." She took a piece of fruit, muttered an abashed "Thank you." Bull gave her thigh a quick squeeze. He felt her leg nudge against his, then, and looked down to see her peering sidelong at him.

" _We've_ done."

He frowned. "Huh?"

"You said what I've done, the good deeds, whatever. But I don't remember doing any of it on my own, not really." Her eyes narrowed. "And if I recall correctly, I'd have been killed by an angry bear in the second month if you weren't around. I’d like to see how they’d have closed the Breach after that."

Bull blinked, and then his face cracked into a grin. "Oh _shit_ , yeah. That was a great fight, damn. You nailed it in the end, though, stole my kill. _Bam_ , right in the eye. All that blood, and you were laughing like a fucking lunatic. I thought you were gonna pass out, you looked so surprised. I never appreciated a staff so much before. Oh, shit, remember the way you cried after, though? Because you'd killed an innocent bear. I thought Blackwall was going to melt into the ground..." he trailed off, laughing.

"Wait, what? I did no such - I was _not_ crying. It was - I was just overwhelmed by the moment because a _bear_ almost ate my _face_ , Bull." She looked on the edge of outrage - as close as a head full of potions would let her get - and like she was about to poke him, but he could see the corners of her lips fighting not to curl upwards. "You know, I'm trying to tell you how important you are and you're being horrible."

"Uh-huh. Still cried, kadan." He caught her hand when she did finally try to take a stab at his belly, raising it up to kiss the back before letting her go. She harrumphed, settling back against the pillows while he snatched one of her orange pieces and popped it into his mouth. "Look, about the council thing...I’m just saying I want you to be prepared. We both knew nothing good was coming, but after the last week? I think it's gonna turn into a real shitstorm."

Emeline didn't having anything to say to that, just leaned her head to rest against his shoulder. Her cheek was warm, the skin soft where his was rough, as always. He could smell her soap through the cloud of her hair, tangerine from her fingers, and underneath the ever-present tang of lyrium and elfroot. She was silent for long enough that Bull wondered if the potions had lulled her to sleep. Then he heard her voice under the crackle of the fire. 

"Maybe that wouldn't be the worst thing," Emeline muttered.  

Bull shifted, careful to try not to disturb her, not sure he'd heard her right.

"Birdie?"

She was quiet for a long moment, plucking at a stray bit of thread on the down quilt until Bull reached over to still her hand with his. She glanced up then.

"I just...maybe it wouldn't be so bad. To be forced to end it all. The Inquisition, that is, with us? Hand it off to the Chantry again, or whoever they decide. Or maybe just put an end to it entirely." Bull could feel the pillows sink as she rolled her left shoulder. 

"...that's a big step. You sure you're ready for that?"

"I don't know." She paused, hesitating. He could see her eyes starting to lose their focus, sleep blurring the edges. "I know... I know that I don't want to do this anymore. I don't think I ever really did, but no one else would, and I had, you know, the almighty magic hand, and now..." she trailed off, pulling her fingers out from under his. She looked as though she was going to grasp her other hand, pop the joints like she always did, in that way that annoyed the shit out of him because it never failed to make him think of dislocations, cold little bird bones pop-pop-popping right out of place.  

She looked that way, of course, until she remembered that she couldn't, that she had no bones left to pop. Her remaining hand went still in mid-air before dropping back to the bed. 

She was very quiet then, her eyes drawn back to the fire. Her fingers were limp when he reached over to grasp them again, but after a moment he felt her thumb curl around his. Her voice barely reached his ears when she finally spoke. 

"I'm so tired, Bull. I'm just so tired."

And the last thing Iron Bull thought before Emeline drifted off to sleep curled against his side, was how strange it was that someone who could look so young one minute, could sound so old the next.


	2. A Beginning

The next week passed slowly and methodically. Potions at breakfast, midday, and before bed. Emeline pulling a face at yet more dull egg and toast and soup concoctions for breakfast and lunch and dinner. Her arm hurt her still, and according to Vivienne’s healers it yet would for another week or so until it turned into the occasional ache, but she bore it reasonably well. She refused the poppy milk after the third day, saying she didn't need it, and Bull didn't protest despite the healer's reservations and knowing it was more about wanting than needing. He'd wondered how long she'd allow it in the first place, before the specter of her mother made her push it away. She got by on elfroot and prophet's laurel after - the latter far dearer than any common garden plant, but given the circumstances, he figured the Empress could foot the bill just fine.

She had visitors, streams of them, but Bull kept most at bay. Sera was there every day, talking a mile a minute one second and swearing vengeance and arrows in Solas's ancient backside the next - lots of arrows. Blackwall dropped in with her on occasion, and on the fourth day he quietly presented Emeline with a little wooden marigold he'd been working on. He tried not to look embarrassed when she had fussed and called Bull over to marvel at “the wee little petals! They're absolutely darling, aren't they?”

Bull agreed that, yes, they were pretty damn darling.

After, Sera made them all cheesy toast over the fire and scolded Bull about making right proper tea for sick people (his was weak as piss, she complained - her Fereldan was showing, Bull retorted, tea wasn't always supposed to look and smell like tree pitch. Which earned him a kick in the backside and a drowsy but amused Emeline declaring that tea was tea, and either way they both drank it wrong, because they never put gooseberry jam in it like any Marcher knows is right and proper. Blackwall grunted his agreement, the crinkle of his eyes the best indication of the little smile under all that beard, even wilder now he was a real Warden - "Damn right." Bull and Sera's twin shudders at the mention of the dreaded jam tea acted as a good enough truce, in the end.)

Dorian came by almost as often, the first time with, of all things, a kitten ("Only on loan, I'm afraid, but I thought you might like the distraction while we talk of more dreadful things - no pun intended, of course.") And chocolate, and wine, and sugared apricots, and some sort of tawdry romance he swore he'd never read - and Emeline believed him, he'd always been the dry academic history sort, more's the pity for him - but that he had on good authority had made Cassandra turn a very unbecoming shade of scarlet.

"I'd meant to procure some of that candied rind you insist on eating,  but it seems some great lout of a Qunari's been wandering around and buying it all up 'for the Inquisitor's recovery' or some such nonsense. Very sweet, no doubt - almost makes me as nauseous as the candy itself. One hopes he's been as enthusiastic about buying up all the clove teeth tinctures, too."

"Oh, it's mostly been the peppermint, actually - the clove hurts my tongue, you know. It's very sad I think, it would complement the orange so terribly well."

"I hadn't thought of that - that is a tragedy, isn't it? But a tragedy with an upside, nonetheless - a bare minimum of rotted teeth, either way."

"You're always such a ray of sunshine, Dorian, did you know? A bastion of unfettered optimism and cheery thoughts. I've always liked that about you, I really have."

"Is that so? What a coincidence, so have I."

Emeline was eager for the distraction - lying about in bed when you can't do anything fun in it had turned out to be very dull indeed, she was sure her brain was rotting at ten times the speed of her teeth - even if it was in the form of discussions about ancient Tevene tomes on Fen'Harel, lost elven magic, and obscure necromantic reanimation practices.

"For the arm, obviously. You can't expect me to allow my dearest friend to wander around with some mechanical hatchet job. I've already been chatting with Dagna, Leliana's ravens are as punctual as ever - brilliant mind, that girl, but a little batty, isn't she? I can see the appeal to our dear archeress. As it happens, we've come up with some ideas..."

Bull didn't understand a quarter of it, though being shacked up for three years with a mage that was prone to her own academic ramblings had given him a leg up on at least some arcane magical theory. Frankly, he had a few reservations about Emeline wandering around with a reanimated anything. What if it got possessed?

Dorian just stared at him like he was an idiot - abeit a dear one, an idiot you sort of blinked at before blessing his heart with the utmost sincerity - when he brought it up, and then started to laugh. Emeline assured Bull that she was fairly certain it didn't work like that. Bull didn't point out that 'fairly' wasn't exactly 'totally', and that weird magical shit happening unexpectedly was basically a defining feature of her life.

The temporary kitten was great, though.

Vivienne couldn't visit, officially - Divine neutrality and all, considering the circumstances - but she had masses of flowers sent to their rooms, enchanted to last twice as long as normal and to smell twice as sweet. They were, in a surprising move, mostly wildflowers and the coarser sort of common blooms usually deemed weeds, but which Emeline had always had a particular fondness for even if Vivienne herself had found them a little gauche. The vases were, of course, stunning, but in classic Vivienne fashion, perfectly suited to their tenants - made of the finest materials but neither too gaudy nor overwhelming for the simple country bouquets their recipient so loved. A letter accompanied them, written in her elegant longhand, which Emeline read to herself and tucked away in her favorite book of little herb and medicinal sketches, alongside her pressed flowers. Bull never read the note himself, and Emeline never shared it with him, but he knew it had made her smile, and her shoulders had straightened just a little as she read it, the way they did whenever Vivienne walked into the room herself.

For his part, Cole came by with some cryptic sayings about the times Emeline had made him work in the garden with her, and how she'd told him weeds were just flowers with a bad reputation and they were the most tenacious and admirable of plants. Then he gave her a dandelion he'd uprooted and stuck into a small glass jar filled with dirt. He'd forgotten to water it. Emeline stared and then cried, and told Cole it was absolutely lovely, and so was he. Bull made vague, panicked soothing gestures on her back and wondered, for the umpteenth time, why Cole always had to make it weird. He watered the dandelion after the kid had left.

Varric popped in with Cassandra, laden down with books to read and gossip from the tavern. He made mention of the villa awaiting its mistress in Kirkwall "...if you'd like to make a quick exit when this shit blows over. And Marigold? No one would blame you a bit if you did." He made sure to note that "they've mostly gotten over the whole Qunari thing. Mostly. And anyway, I'm Viscount now. That's gotta have some perks, right?"

"Uh...thanks, Varric. I think."

"Hey, no problem, Tiny."

Cassandra and Emeline spoke quietly about Solas, the next few days, the Council - though Emeline was careful not to mention her reservations, and Bull wondered if she really was planning on making that quick exit. Varric was right - he couldn't blame her. Still, he wondered where exactly he was fitting into all of this - where she wanted him to fit in.

* * *

 

He brought up the Council again himself on the sixth day, sitting on the bed bootless and down to his favorite nightpants, dealing out cards for another round of Wicked Grace. They'd decided on the stakes being the goodies and candies various well-wishers had sent up in decorative baskets, and out of those what Bull had sussed out as being definitely non-poisonous and/or not made of despondent mushrooms or the like.

Orlesians.

"I'm just saying, whatever you want to do, kadan, I'm there. And so are the boys, if it comes to that. But maybe you need to walk in with a plan." _Or you might buckle, and your nightmares are going to get worse, and you've already paid enough in blood._

If there was anything Bull had learned over the last three years, it was that there was merit in knowing when it was time to walk away. He could admit that now. And she didn't have re-educators to fall back on.

"I think...I want to disband it."

Bull whistled, looking up. "Damn. Full-stop?"

She nodded, her mouth firm. "Full-stop. I've thought about it, and...if we're going to have to stop Solas, which we will -"

"- because no one else is gonna do shit until they get their heads out of their asses -"

"- exactly, and we both know that's not likely to happen any time soon. And then with the Qunari on top of it..." she trailed off. "Well, it's not like there aren't other problems on the horizon. So if anyone is going to be called on to stop him, it's going to be the Inquisition, you know how it goes," - Bull hummed his agreement - "but I just don't think the we can do it. Not the way we are now. We're too big, he has spies everywhere, he said so himself. And I do think he has enough fondness or respect or something leftover not to lie to me. Well. Again, anyway."

"Yeah, or he's so sure of himself he doesn't see any reason to hide the truth."

"Well. Yes, that too. I was trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. Anyway, the point is,  I don't know who to trust other than you and our friends." She paused. "And honestly... I don't want to be called on to solve every problem for every little skirmish. It all seems a little pointless now, anyway, doesn't it? I know Cassandra and the rest think we're maintaining order or whatever, and maybe they're not wrong, but it's too much. It's been too much. I can't stand the scrutiny anymore, like I'm just some extraordinary bug under a glass. I never asked for it, I was never prepared, and I'm tired of it." She took a breath. "It's just...I was supposed to be a gardener, for Andraste's sake. I bandaged children's scraped knees and read weird old books on, I don't know, Nevarran sex magic or something. And I was perfectly happy to do that! Not that I think life is all about being happy, all the time, but I don't think it's about, I don't know, this, either." She waved her hand at the room, her arm. "Or it shouldn't be." She looked down at the cards she'd propped up on her folded legs. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to get all...overwrought, or anything. But there it is. And I do know it's selfish, for what it's worth."

"Hey. Hey." Bull reached out and rubbed her knee. "Look at me. You don't have to explain yourself to me." He gave her leg a squeeze. "And - for what it's worth - I'm pretty sure you left selfish behind somewhere around the time you kicked Corypheus back into the ass end of the fade. You did what you could. You still are. Shit, it's not like you're running away to the Rivaini coast for a beach vacation while Orlais's being sucked up into a giant Fade hole." She snorted, flicking her eyes up at him from under her brow but continued to fiddle with her cards, and he paused. Then he gave a little wolfish leer. "That's not a bad idea, though. You know," he shifted, leaning back, "a lot of those beaches are clothing optional -"

"Oh, honestl - you're ridiculous." But she was smiling now, and played a card, a red queen. "And anyway, aren't all beaches clothing optional as long as no one's looking?"

Bull let out an exaggerated groan.

"Kadan, don't tease me like that."

"Please, as though it'd be anything you haven't seen a thousand times over. You know, I'd like to see that, though. A Rivaini beach. I've heard the water is very blue, like sapphires."

Bull nodded, considering his cards. "Bluer. Warm too, not like here. Kind of like taking a really salty bath. And you can walk out into it hundreds of feet before you have to turn back."

Emeline squinted, cocking her head in a 'you're having me on again, aren't you?' sort of way.

"Wait, really? Are you just making that up? That seems a terribly long way."

Bull gave a little conciliatory shrug. "Well, not everywhere. And the water has to be calm or you'll fall on your ass. But in some places, sure."

"Hm." She'd pursed her lips, and Bull assumed she was probably combing her mental backlogs for a book or a scroll that might have mentioned this - sometimes he still forgot how much of her experience of the wider world was built on the back of a life spent surrounded by old books and an inability to sleep longer than four hours at a stretch. "Is the sand golden? Or white?"

"Gold, mostly. Pretty. Up north, in Seheron and Par Vollen, there's beaches where it's completely black. Some are red," - he smiled - " you'd like those. And the water has these coral formations all under it. They're a mess for the ships to deal with but they're nice to look at, I guess. You can see the fish swimming through when you go out on the skiffs - not the kind you eat, the little guys."

He could imagine her gasping and smacking his arm every time she saw a new one, some little striped clownfish or something. She'd have a hat, he thought, a sunhat, the sort Southerners liked. Pretty and mostly pointless against the harsh Northern sun. Straw, perched just so on top of her pile of hair done up the way he liked - all loose and soft and ready to tumble down over his hands when he tugged at her hair pins. She'd lean over too far and lose it, and be sad about watching it bob away on the waves until he mentioned getting some fried pepper cakes with lunch. Then she'd start talking about the amazing variety of medicinal pepper species in the north or some shit and forget all about the hat, and he'd try not to laugh.

She'd probably wear something white and floaty, he thought. Little laces on the bodice, begging to be pulled loose. Short enough to be scandalous anywhere south of Antiva City and flippy enough to keep him distracted whenever she moved, and she'd walk barefoot on the beach even if the sand was hot enough to burn anyone else's feet, because hers were always cold and she never minded a little pain with her pleasure. He could see it clear as day.

Of course, it'd never happen. But still, it made a pretty picture.

"Bull? Are you listening?" She was peering at him from behind her mug of tea, having already played her card and apparently now talking. "What are you thinking about?"

Bull blinked, and then he shrugged and grinned.

"Your ass all oiled up with sand stuck to it, mostly." He laid down his cards, barely even glancing at them. "White sand, if you're wondering."

"Of course you are. Intriguing, but I have to say, sounds terribly itchy."

"Yeah, well, it's why you have to have someone around to wipe it off for you."

"Hm, how very convenient."

"Yeah, funny how that works, huh?" Emeline was eyeing his play - a pair of aces -  and made a little disappointed clucking noise. He grinned, quick, before his face turned thoughtful again. "So you're cutting the Inquisition loose, planning a nice long vacation...where're you thinking of heading?"

Emeline looked up, confusion writ across her brow.

"What do you mean?"

"You know we're not gonna be able to stay in Skyhold after you disband, Em. It's in the shitass end of nowhere and it's gonna run through money like water through a sieve if there's not enough cash coming in. The Chargers do pretty damn good, but even we don't do that good."

"Oh - _oh!_ " Her hand fluttered up as if to dismiss the obvious, and she puffed a stray curl from her face. "Well, obviously, no, I don't plan on, what, squatting in the _mountains_. In Solas’s old house or whatever, on top of it? How macabre.” 

Bull held up a hand, all innocence. “Hey, I’m just making sure you’ve thought through all the angles. Not much point in making plans if you’re not working out all the steps.” He chuckled under his breath. “Macabre. I like that.”

Emeline pulled a face. “Anyway, you don't even like the cold, so I don't see the point in staying any longer if we don't have to." Her hand moved over to scratch her bandaging until Bull made a low 'uh-uh' noise, and she sighed, reaching instead for her mug of tea. "I suppose I just thought, you know. You could...decide, I guess. If you wanted." She cleared her throat. "Where we went."

It took Bull a beat to respond.

"...Em, you remember the years before we met I moved from tavern to tavern, right?" His protest was weak, though, and though it was small still, and he couldn't hide the surprise on his face, he was starting to smile.

Emeline looked vaguely offended. "Don't be silly, of course I do. And if you want to pick that back up, that's fine too. I just...could maybe tag along this time, is the thing. And if you don't," she hurried on, "then you could think of a place you might like to have as a sort of home base?" She shrugged. "I don't have anything informing my preferences other than, I don't know, what sort of food I like or if I like a water view or the mountains. I don't have family, none I keep in touch with anyway." She let out an airy little laugh, like she'd just surprised herself. "I don't even have a _job_ , Bull. Or I won't, soon enough. But you do. So wherever you want to go - I can follow. If you want." She peered over her mug at him. "It's your life too, you know. You have all these choices now - I seem to remember you saying so yourself a few years back. 'S absolutely terrible, I know, believe me."

He was smiling fully now. "Yeah, pretty awful." He paused, watching her, and Emeline took a self-conscious sip of her tea before leaning over to grab a chocolate and fiddling with her remaining cards. He grabbed one too, chewing thoughtfully, and let the silence stretch out for a bit before he leaned forward, resting his arm across her knees.

"So, the thing is, kadan -"

Emeline's head popped up, the chocolate poofing out her cheek a bit, eyes big and a little wary.

"I know you like the water more than the mountains, no contest, and you really like Orlesian cakes. And a little bird tells me Dagna’s looking to set up shop in Val Royeaux and a certain archer is all set to follow, and she’s got a fellow Red Jenny - at least that’s what I hear - that she’s itching to show around the funner parts of town. Which makes me think a nice little place near the city might suit us just fine..."

Emeline's lips started to curl upwards.

"But how much _do_ you actually like shitty taverns?"  


End file.
